The Rothstein Trustees vs. The QTask Baron: Round 8

South Florida Business Journal by Paul Brinkmann, Reporter

Date: Tuesday, July 31, 2012, 2:53pm EDT

In the long-running dispute between software entrepreneur Reichart Von Wolfsheild and the Scott Rothstein bankruptcy trustee, there are new allegations that Von Wolfsheild isn’t living up to the conditions of a recent legal settlement.

In court motions filed Monday, court-appointed trustee Herbert Stettin’s attorneys accused Von Wolfsheild of siphoning customers from a software platform now owned by the trustee.

Von Wolfsheild agreed to hand over the assets of Qtask to the trustee to settle a lawsuit. However, since then, Von Wolfsheild launched a similar platform under the name Prolific. Both Qtask and Prolific are online platforms for document and task management, along with electronic communication.

Von Wolfsheild was caught up in Rothstein’s Ponzi scheme when his software company, Burbank-based Qtask, accepted $7.5 million as an investment from Rothstein. The money was later deemed to be dirty, proceeds from Rothstein’s $1.4 billion fraud. Stettin sued Qtask and Von Wolfsheild for return of the money to the estate of Rothstein’s defunct law firm, Rothstein Rosenfeldt Adler.

Wolfsheild – who uses the title “baron” in some circumstances – was a recent co-host for a series on the History Channel called Inventions USA.

According to the trustee’s attorneys, “Qtask and Von Wolfsheild have intentionally diverted and appropriated Qtask assets and intellectual property to a new entity controlled by Von Wolfsheild… (He) transferred users of the Qtask system and their data previously held in the Qtask system.”

But Von Wolfsheild’s attorneys said in an email that the trustee has it wrong.

“Qtask is an open source operating system that is open to the world and may be used by any third party. The amended settlement agreement did not convey exclusive rights to the trustee, nor did it contain a non-compete provision. The users and the user data are not assets of Qtask and therefore could not be diverted. Users are given a choice to continue with Qtask or use the Prolific platform. It is the users that move their data, not Von Wolfsheild,” Qtask attorney Bart Houston wrote in an email.

The dispute between Von Wolfsheild has simmered since Rothstein’s scheme was exposed in 2009. At one point Qtask was fined for alleged delays in responding to court orders.

Houston said the trustee was aware that Qtask was still in a “pre-revenue” phase and users were not paying for the service.

“It would appear that the trustee and his professional are having ‘buyers remorse’, and after spending tens of thousands in fees to obtain the Qtask assets, now want to litigate more,” Houston said.